So... who wants to hear about Uncle Pinecone? Anyone?

OK... so it turns out that I have an uncle I have never met... or, at least I am relatively sure that this guy is my uncle, based on some key facts. I will comment on these throughout the articles below where appropriate. Nobody in my family has ever met this man; he has no idea that any of us exist.

Normal text is my own.

Text in italics is copied from a news article.

Text in bold is a replacement for the original text, in an effort to protect the privacy of Uncle Pinecone and others.

Woodsman: Book bio false

Sunday, April 30, 2006

By L. Hajna

Uncle Pinecone doesn't necessarily consider himself a Piney -- not by birthright, at least.

He was born in Trenton. His mother put him up for adoption when he was very young, too young to care much.

This man's name is not "Uncle Pinecone"... the original article provided his real name... be nice and leave him alone, OK?

OK, anyway... so this part of the article was the big attention-grabber. The last name is not a very common one, and happens to be the exact same spelling of my father's original last name. You see, my father, too, was born in Trenton. As an infant, he was put up for adoption at an orphanage in Ewing, a suberb of Trenton. Among other oddities that appear on my father's adoption certificate, his full birth name is printed, first and last name. This information alone, paired with the news article, is enough to convince me that there is a good chance this man is my father's brother. Then, I had a look at the photos... now, I can't say that Uncle Pinecone looks just like my father, but I will say that he shares a number of important facial features (except the nose... right shape, but Uncle Pinecone's seems kinda' large in the photos). In fact... looking at the first photo I really do see a slightly older version of my father.

He was raised by foster families around Woodland's Chatsworth, the self-proclaimed Capital of the Pines.

Uncle Pinecone got into working the woods in the late 1960s "because I seen other people goin' out and gettin' it and all, and I just joined in with 'em, that's all."

He is the second character to appear in Author's classic 19XX book, "A Book", which set in motion efforts to protect the region.

Author, who met Uncle Pinecone at another Piney's home, described him as having a "long, straight nose and high cheekbones, in a deeply tanned face that was, somehow, gaunt."

Author weaves Uncle Pinecone's story throughout the book, calling him "as shy a person as I have ever had a chance to know."

Author describes how Uncle Pinecone tried building a small cranberry bog by hand, and how he took Bible correspondence courses, and aspired to marry and raise a family.

Author even recounts how Uncle Pinecone once pulled out his Winchester rifle to scare off a reporter who was trying to learn how Pineys live.

"I'd have never shot to kill him Uncle Pinecone says in the book. "But I'd have threw lead at him if I was scared enough. I wasn't scared enough."

Today, Uncle Pinecone disputes those stories. He says he never studied the Bible nor tried building a bog, although he acknowledges chasing off a reporter who was snooping through his window -- but not with a gun.

"It's wrong. To tell you the truth, I never read it. I just looked at it and started reading it a little, but that was enough for me," he says.

At first Uncle Pinecone seems hesitant, but he quickly warms to a reporter who visited him recently to learn if remnants of the Piney culture still exist. He displays pride in explaining how he lives, as if he realizes he has an obligation to history.

His simple one-story house, built around 1910 as an office for a clay mine, is owned by a company. Uncle Pinecone rents it through a hunting club that leases the property.

It has electricity, but is heated by big wood stoves, one in the main room and a bigger one in the basement that pumps hot air through iron vents. The kitchen has another wood stove.

Uncle Pinecone has a microwave and two refrigerators, one broken.

A TV, a radio and a small tape player sit on a table in a large main room on which also sits a skillet containing a half-eaten bean stew.

He has running water, but uses a two-seater outhouse.

Inside his home, he whips out weathered copies of local histories of the Pine Barrens, and a copy of a 19XX National Geographic article in which Author revisited the people of the Pine Barrens. Uncle Pinecone talked with McPhee for that article too, but is never mentioned.

Things have changed a lot since then, sometimes in what he calls dark ways.

Marijuana is being grown in the woods, and illegal dumping is a big problem, he says. People aren't respecting the woods, he laments.

But some people are pursuing his traditional pursuits, even if they aren't the traditional Pineys.

They're pulling out brush mostly, sometimes mothers and children.

He nods to them but isn't sure who they are. He believes some may be migrant farm workers looking for a little extra income in the off-season.

In a sense, they're carrying on the Piney tradition, he says, and it's one reason he is reluctant to characterize himself as the last Piney.

"The last," he says, leaning back thoughtfully in his chair, "that's sayin' somethin.' "

Photos by A. Steinhardt